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Amazing Woman Wednesday – Meet Angela Patterson

What could you not accept if you but knew that everything that happens, all events past, present and to come, are gently planned by One whose only purpose is your good? ~ A Course in Miracles

Silly us. We tend to spend our lives searching for perfection. Trying desperately not to make mistakes. Being what we think might be pleasing to other people’s sensibilities. What we don’t get is: we are born perfect, by design.And, our only job here, our only purpose, is to live.

To be a human being, means to be a human, being. And how are we to discover, or rather, uncover what that means if not by trial and oft times, error? If we came to the type of perfect that we have fooled ourselves into believing exists, what then, would be the point of living?

What are humans if not flawed, pained, corrupted, tested, challenged, provoked individuals? And were it not for these things, from what place would redemption come? How then, would we come to know grace, or mercy? If it were not for the darkness, what purpose then would the light serve?

It is through the observance of challenges, that we come to know the truth of our lives, how utterly perfect we truly are indeed.

I’d like to introduce you to Angela Patterson. She’s a 30-something, divorced mother of three who in the last few years has had her share of adversity to overcome.She’s smart, pretty, a career woman. She’s driven and poised, even in the thick of things. You’d look at Angela and think, “now there’s a lady who’s got it all together.”

But two years ago, when separation from the man she had been married to since the age of 19 became a probability, nothing could’ve been further from the truth.She suddenly found herself financially strapped, emotionally stretched and living, children in tow, with her mom—something she hadn’t had to do since she was a teenager.

It was a trying time to say the least. She came face-to-face with an internal fear, the likes of which she had not known before.It gripped her like a vice. Panic set in, and so then too, did the universe.

When we express a desire or need that speaks to our greater good, the universe conspires with everything in its reach to make whatever we need to happen, happen.It uses people, circumstances and situations.It pits us against the self we had at one point believed ourselves to be.

The thing about the universe is though, that it tends not to sugar coat, glamorize or romanticize things for us. The universe is a provocateur of sorts. It’ll cause sensational events to transpire, ugliness will rear its head. Loss, tragedy and disruption might be used as tools to get us to pay attention to what deserves, in a moment, our attention, in order that we can have/experience our hearts desire.

Angela, suddenly finding herself interrupted by the onset of divorce, was forced by virtue of universal will, into what she now recognizes as her life’s work.Forced into the realization that she is indeed, strong.

“Getting divorced was one of the most difficult challenges I’ve had to overcome.But it helped me learn who Angela is. I learned that I’m a lot stronger than I thought I was.I remember during the whole process, I would be upset and crying because I was so very afraid. I had nothing. Nothing by way of security. I moved in with my mother and she told me I could stay as long as I needed to. But at the same time, in her motherly wisdom she let me know that I had to keep moving, that I had to push through. I truly didn’t think I was strong enough. I didn’t think I had it.But, some how, I instinctively knew that God had something greater for me than where I was or what I was at that point. So I made a conscious choice to keep moving.That’s faith. It was only by faith that I could do it.”

And that’s how it happens. We transmit a desire out into the universe. Then the universe does whatever it must to make that desire true for us. It will turn things upside down and inside-out if necessary. It will totally disrupt life as we know it so that we can have what it is we ultimately desire.

Sometimes our true self gets lost in the façade of a life we have created. We sink into an emotionally abusive marriage because we think that’s what we’re supposed to do. We’ll choose a career based upon security rather than personal fulfillment. We become so serious about being and doing what others expect. And we do this for so long that we forget or denounce what living really means for us. That is, until we get hit by a ton of bricks disguised as divorce proceedings.

“I didn’t know if I could handle it. I had been subjected to years of emotional abuse, and as a result, suffered from post-traumatic stress. I remember being then, a shell of myself. Everything that makes me who I am, I, at some point had lost that. But I didn’t know I lost it until I walked out.”

Then something happens. Sometimes our faith just automatically kicks in and other times it’s ushered in by a mom or friend or guardian angel who wants for you precisely what the universe wants for you—for you to live your best life. There comes a time when our spiritual reserve steps up to the plate. These are the times when we think we can’t, when we don’t believe ourselves to be strong enough.These are also the times when we are proven wrong.

“All I had was faith. I didn’t have money. I didn’t know how I was going to pay rent. I just had this faith. I knew it was going to work out, that things would come together. So I started paying attention. Any opportunity I received, I took advantage of it. Inside of me I felt like I was on the right path. I felt like I was doing what I should be doing. I knew, some how, that God was with me.”

These days Angela defines faith as those moments when even though you are in doubt, you can still manage to remind yourself of your current blessings and that God had made a way up until this point. And then, have the ability to completely surrender.

“I had to look deep into who I was to find the thing I was good at and what I felt God put me here to do. I know now that it’s taking care of people, so I used that as my base. God was putting the pieces of puzzle together for me. So I just kept reminding myself: it’s bigger than you. “

Angela Patterson is an AFC home staffing entrepreneur who currently resides in Southeastern Michigan with her 3 children.